Editor’s Note: Master Resource’s founder and editor, Rob Bradley, is currently struggling with the aftermath of torrential flooding in the Texas Hill Country. Until he can return to work, he has asked me to post “classic” MR entries. A blog post explaining Vaclav Smil’s concept of “power density” surely qualifies. This is the key concept for understanding a civilization’s energy needs.

Unfortunately, our MR files contain no concise explanation of the concept in layman’s language. (We have many explanations that no conceivable lay reader—myself most definitely included—could possibly understand or appreciate.) The closest thing I could find to a useful journalistic entry was a blog post by Kent Hawkins—a retired electrical engineer in Ontario—published on February 20, 2013. It is reprinted below.—Roger Donway, Managing Editor.

Power Density Separates the Wheat from the Chaff

By Kent Hawkins — February 20, 2013

“Power density (W/m²) is perhaps the most revealing variable in energetics…”[1]- Vaclav Smil

It may be a bit of an exaggeration to say that understanding power density may be all the average person requires to put our energy sources and needs into perspective, but there is some merit in this argument.…

Editor’s Note: Master Resource’s founder and editor, Rob Bradley, is currently struggling with the aftermath of torrential flooding in the Texas Hill Country. Until he can return to work, he has asked me to post “classic” MR entries. The following surely qualifies. It is a review of the book that he and Richard Fulmer published in 2004, and that gave its name to this blog.—Roger Donway, Managing Editor.

This book review was published just short of 20 years ago in The Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics [Vol. 8, No. 3 (FALL 2005): 93–95] by Pierre Desrochers of the University of Toronto.

“Austrian economists have so far contributed very little to energy studies…. This book could therefore go a long way in providing a new set of concrete economic examples and principles for use in classroom discussions.”

This post excerpts energy and climate material from the Media Balance Newsletter, a free fortnightly published by physicist John Droz Jr., founder of the Alliance for Wise Energy Decisions.

Greed Energy Economics:
*** Alex Epstein: Where the fight against energy subsidies stands
Alex Epstein: The Senate totally fails to terminate the Green New Scam
Alex Epstein: What I really told Thom Tillis about terminating new solar/wind subsidies using “placed in service”
How the Senate can save hundreds of billions of dollars—and our grid—by truly terminating IRA subsidiesThe Big Beautiful Bill Torpedoes Big Solar & Big Wind

Unreliables (General):
*** Renewable energy is doomed
*** ‘All Of The Above’ Is DEI For Energy
*** Shattered Green Dreams

Wind Energy — Other:
*** Feds ignore their research on windmills killing eagles
Watch Craig Rucker on wind energy
Wind turbine blade crashes into traffic on busy Northeast interstate
The ‘Wind Scam’ of Wind Turbines — There’s nothing clean about this

Nuclear Energy:
*** The Trump Administration Advocates for Nuclear Power
*** New Policy Report: Transforming the Back End of the U.S.…

Ed Note: The solar industry is in “a fight for our lives,” in the words of the head of the Solar Energy Industries Association. (Fifteen extensions of the Investment Tax Credit are not enough.) But the narrative has long been that solar is “competitive,” or almost so. The news story posted below, from 1994, is part of this false narrative.

“Federal officials, aware that solar power breakthroughs have shined and faded almost as often as the sun, say the Enron project could introduce commercially competitive technology without expensive Government aid.” (- Allen Myerson, New York Times, November 15, 1994)

Thirty-one years ago, the ‘newspaper of record’ excitedly reported atop the business section that a breakthrough with solar energy had occurred with the business genius of the upstart energy company Enron.…